Building Up a New World (2025 Easter Series)

We are resurrection people. We honor, follow, and celebrate the God of the New, who rolls away stones, transforms lives, and shows up in unexpected places.

Bracketed by Resurrection and Pentecost, the Easter Season reminds us that the story does not end with resurrection but with the birthing of the church, the life, love, and legacy of Christ embodied in our collective body. On Easter, Jesus rose with power; on Pentecost, the Spirit empowered those who follow The Way to continue the radical ministry of hope and restoration for all creation.

The church is called to imitate Jesus as agents of transformation and justice through Embodied Jubilee. For the Easter Season, Sermon Seeds and Worship Ways will use the theme, “Building Up a New World,” which is also the title of the 2025 All Church Read. We will consider the call, as church, to be community organizers as demonstrated by Jesus and the biblical witness along with the wisdom of today’s faithful organizers. Each week, we will bring a passage from a chapter of the All Church Read into conversation with scripture texts. The suggested congregational responses will connect specifically with the practices that will facilitate embodying the themes, practices, and truths found in Building Up a New World.

This season invites us to consider our role and responsibility as Christ followers in the world as well as within the institution of the church. Truth telling, faithful examination, and new ways of living and being are essential responses to our current moment and long-term vigilance as citizens of the Kindom of God.

“Injustices continue to permeate the Christian church and society, dominating people’s thinking based on historical and contemporary ideologies of inhumane behaviors towards people of African, Native, Asian and Pacific Islander, and Latin descents. Injustices are a result of human behaviors influenced by deeply held beliefs that there are groups of human beings who are disposable, inferior, and expendable.” – Rev. Dr. Velda Love, UCC Minister for Racial Justice, BUNW Introduction

Injustice is antithetical to the gospel and repudiated by the Day of Pentecost. Dr. Love further notes,

“This book demands readers to expand their peripheral vision to see what God sees: humanity in non-binary, non-restrictive gender identities and orientations with a conviction to live life beyond traditionalisms that bind, kill, destroy, cage, incarcerate, poison, deprive, enslave, ethnically cleanse, grab land, and constrict one’s beliefs and daily practices. The invitation has been extended and new tools for strategies of justice are waiting for you.”

Building up a New World.

Resurrection Sunday C, April 20: Luke 24:1-12 | “At Early Dawn”

Easter 2C, April 27: John 20:19-31 | “Locked Doors”

Easter 3C, May 4: John 21:1-19 | “Cast the Net”

Easter 4C, May 11: John 10:22-30 | “The Works Testify”

Easter 5C, May 18: John 13:31-35 | “Looking for Love”

Easter 6C, May 25: John 5:1-9 | “A Sabbath” | ellie due 4/14

Ascension Sunday  7C, June 1: Luke 24:44-53 | “Opened Minds”

Pentecost C, June 8: John 14:8-17, 25-27 | “Truth, Trouble, and Fear”

Year C 2024-2025 Seeds and Ways Focus and Roadmap: Embodied Jubilee: Justice, Righteousness, and Redemption

In the biblical narrative, justice and righteousness were often encapsulated in the same word. In fact, when reading the text, when encountering the word “righteousness”, it would be entirely appropriate to substitute the word “justice.” In Year C, with an emphasis on the Gospel according to Luke, the emphasis will be on reclaiming justice as an essential element of the reign and realm of God and both a hope and sign of the kindom of God manifested on earth. Luke’s account gives particular attention and significant emphasis on the marginalized, oppressed, and silenced in society. Individual righteousness, a derivative or consequence of following the way of justice, will be treated as such.

Jubilee, represented by the settling of all debts, will be claimed as the ultimate destination of the collective and communal faith journey. The call to discipleship throughout this liturgical year will be to participate in Embodied Jubilee. The Suggested Congregational Response to the Reflection will point to and offer a path to engage with this call.

Finally, no treatment of justice and jubilee would be complete without a focus on the redemptive acts of the Holy One and God’s disciples in human history. That is good news. Let’s proclaim it!

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The Rev. Dr. Cheryl A. Lindsay, Minister for Worship and Theology, United Church of Christ, (lindsayc@ucc.org), also serves as a local church pastor and worship scholar-practitioner with a particular interest in the proclamation of the word in gathered communities.